


unobservant

by thestarsaretalking



Series: i think it's finally safe for me to fall [2]
Category: Space Force (TV)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Established Relationship, Fluff, Holding Hands, M/M, literally just chan and tony being cute together do i need to explain further
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-22
Updated: 2020-08-22
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:01:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,555
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26011552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thestarsaretalking/pseuds/thestarsaretalking
Summary: General Naird is the last person to find out that Tony and Chan are dating because he somehow misses all the signs. (aka 5 times general naird didn’t realize chan and tony were dating and the 1 time he did)
Relationships: Adrian Mallory & Mark R. Naird, Chan Kaifang & F. Tony Scarapiducci & Angela Ali, Chan Kaifang/F. Tony Scarapiducci, Mark R. Naird & F. Tony Scarapiducci
Series: i think it's finally safe for me to fall [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1884013
Comments: 9
Kudos: 35





	unobservant

**Author's Note:**

> this fic is dedicated to chantony brainrot gc on twitter thank you for being willing to raid space force twitter intern's house with me yall are amazing!!

General Naird was the last person at the Space Force base to figure out that Dr. Chan and F. Tony had started dating. It even took him months to figure out that they both weren’t straight, despite the fact that Tony wore a small enamel pin with the pansexual pride flag on his tie and Chan had a small gay pride flag in his mug. In fact, when Naird was looking over Chan’s shoulder, he noticed Chan’s succulent-patterned mug next to his monitor in the control center, pointed at its contents, and questioned, “What’s that?”

Chan glanced at where Naird was pointing and opened his mouth to explain what the pride flag was, but before he could do so, Naird moved his finger closer to the pens that were next to the pride flag. “Are those tiny people on the back of pens?”

Almost sighing out loud in relief, Chan realized that the general was pointing at his pens and informed, “Those are my Pop Figure pen toppers.”

“Pop Figures? What are those?”

“They’re basically small versions of characters but the characters have big heads and small bodies. These are Pop Figure pen toppers so they’re smaller versions of regular Pop Figures and they’re attached to pens. See?” Chan took out his pen with the small Pop Figure of Rocket the Raccoon attached to the back of it and handed it over to Naird.

Naird looked over the pen briefly before giving it back to the scientist. “Huh.”

Chan knew for certain that Naird hadn’t noticed the flag when he assumed that Chan and Angela were dating. To be fair, when Naird saw Angela was holding Chan’s hand, he had no clue that Angela was mocking the way Tony constantly held Chan’s hand ever since they started dating.

When Angela first found out Chan and Tony were dating, she was most shocked by the fact that Chan let Tony hold his hand, even though he once insisted “adult acquaintances don’t hold hands.” Tony took advantage of his hand-holding privileges and Angela constantly lovingly made fun of the couple. She made an exaggerated kissing face as she held her friend’s hand up and jokingly quipped, “I’m Fuck Tony and I love my boyfriend so much that I have to hold his hand every time I’m within ten feet of him!”

“Shut up, I don’t sound like that,” Tony protested, crossing his arms and pouting like a little toddler. Angela arched an eyebrow skeptically and he sunk a little lower on the bench. “Okay, maybe a little bit. But I don’t sound as whiny as that, I swear.”

As Chan and Angela doubled over with laughter, General Naird walked over. Only having seen Angela holding Chan’s hand and making kissing motions, he assumed that she was legitimately romancing Chan and decided that he needed to congratulate his colleagues.

“Dr. Chan, Captain Ali. I believe congratulations are in order,” Naird grinned, confident that he had figured it all out. Angela, Tony, and Chan all exchanged looks of surprise that quickly turned into ones of humor. Tony glanced down at his knees and coughed into his mouth to hide the laugh bubbling up his throat as Angela pressed her lips tightly together to smother a giggle.

Chan, who was also having trouble keeping it together, managed a smile, and replied, “Thank you, General.”

General Naird nodded, satisfied to hear Chan’s confirmation, and walked away with a little more bounce in his step. Once Naird was out of earshot, they all burst out laughing.

“Me? Dating Chan? God, that man’s gaydar is broken,” Angela shook her head as she clutched her sides, her chest heaving with laughter. When the laughing subdued, she suggested, “We should bet on how long it’ll take Naird to figure out that you two are dating.”

“You’re on,” Chan mischievously agreed, a grin spreading across his face as he started thinking about how to win the bet. So, after the three friends placed bets on how long it would take Naird to figure it out, Tony and Chan began doing their best to hide their relationship from the General as long as possible so they could win the bet. Angela had bet that they would slip up within a week but Tony and Chan both estimated that it would take Naird a few months at least.

The first time Naird should have figured out that Tony and Chan had started dating was when he saw the homescreen of Tony’s phone.

Tony had set a photo of Chan with a peony tucked in his hair as his phone wallpaper and Naird saw said photo when Tony’s phone, which was lying on a desk since Tony had put it there so he could argue with Brad about the latest episode of The Bachelor, lit up with a notification.

Picking up the media consultant’s phone to get a better look at the photo, Naird frowned, confused to see Chan’s face on Tony’s phone. “Tony, why do you have a picture of Chan as your phone wallpaper?”

Tony suddenly stopped arguing and ran back into the room to snatch his phone out of Naird’s hands. “Shoot, that was a mistake! I probably did that on accident.”

Somehow, Naird bought the excuse, not realizing that Tony, a person whose job revolved around knowing how technology works, was the last person who would accidentally set the wrong photo as his phone wallpaper.

The second signal Naird should have picked up on was Tony holding Chan’s hand.

Naird was walking with Mallory when he spotted Tony and Chan walking together with their hands intertwined. Before Mallory could stop him, Naird walked over to the two boys with a puzzled expression on his face and asked, “Tony, why are you holding Chan’s hand?”

The couple separated their hands and moved further away from each other, not expecting Naird’s presence. Chan brushed a lock of hair to the side as he fibbed, “We were holding hands because Tony didn’t want me to get lost.”

“Exactly, yes. That’s why I was holding Chan’s hand.” Tony nodded in agreement, folding his arms across his chest.

Naird glanced back and forth between Chan and Tony and shook his head, mumbling to himself, “You guys are so weird.”

Mallory, who had been watching from the sidelines during the interaction, understood what was going on and gave Chan and Tony a look that communicated “you aren’t fooling anybody” before trailing after Naird.

The third time Naird should have caught on was when Tony was standing in line in front of him at Meal Armstrong. Naird wasn’t paying much attention to Tony but he heard Tony say, “Can I get a scoop of superman ice cream with sprinkles on top in a cone and a scoop of mint chocolate chip ice cream in a cone?”

As Naird watched Erin prepare Tony’s order, he tapped Tony on the shoulder. “Tony, why did you order two scoops of ice cream?”

“Oh, they’re both for me.” Tony managed to keep a straight face as he lied. As Erin handed him both of the cones, Tony thanked her and walked away, holding a cone in each hand.

When Naird stepped up to the stand to order, he had no clue that behind his back, Tony was handing the cone of mint chocolate chip ice cream to Chan. Erin’s mouth dropped open as she saw Chan pressing a grateful kiss on Tony’s cheek before he licked his ice cream cone and Naird snapped his fingers in front of Erin’s face. “Erin? Hello? Are you okay?”

Erin looked away from Tony and Chan, who were sitting on a bench together and eating ice cream. Tony put an arm around Chan’s shoulder and Erin had to force herself to look away before her staring became obvious. “Yep, I’m great. Uh, sorry, what was your order again?”

The fourth time Naird should have noticed was when Tony and Chan were leaving work together in the same car.

Naird was prepared to head home after another long and tedious day at work when he saw Tony holding open the car door to the passenger seat of his car for Chan. Tony gestured to the empty seat dramatically and said, “M’lady.”

Just as Chan was about to get into the car, he suddenly noticed the blank stare Naird was giving him and Tony. He stood a little straighter and cleared his throat. “General Naird. I’m carpooling with Tony to, um, save some gas. To save the environment.”

“Good. Helping the environment. Very good,” Naird responded before turning around to walk to his car. He didn’t see Tony and Chan sigh in relief after he left and he certainly didn’t see Chan kiss Tony on the cheek as Tony started the car.

The fifth time Naird should have realized Tony and Chan started dating was when he caught Chan napping in Tony’s office.

Because he had stayed up all night to finish checking lab samples, Chan was exhausted the next morning. He struggled to stay awake and when Tony stopped by the lab to check in on his boyfriend, he saw that Chan had put his arms on the lab bench and was resting his head on his arms like they were a makeshift pillow.

Tony put one arm under Chan’s knees while his other arm supported Chan’s back, and he carried his boyfriend into his office, gently putting him down on the soft sofa. Chan curled up on the couch and mumbled something incoherent as Tony carefully removed his glasses and put them on the desk so he could sleep more comfortably.

After Tony took off his suit jacket, he carefully draped the jacket across Chan’s torso as a makeshift blanket. Just as Tony was about to press a kiss to Chan’s forehead, General Naird burst into the room loudly. “Fuck Tony, can you explain why-”

Tony shushed the general, who had stopped in mid-step when he saw Chan sleeping on the couch in Tony’s office. He guided Naird out of his office and closed the door behind him before he asked, “Sir, what do you need?”

“Why is- you know what, I’m not even going to ask.” Thankfully, Naird decided to drop the topic as he concluded that Tony was just being a good friend by letting Chan nap in his office. Tony only experienced a moment of relief when Naird let it slide before the general started chewing him out for beefing with the official Disney Twitter account when he should have been tweeting about the upcoming launch.

The one time Naird finally found out about Tony and Chan was the one time the couple made a major slip-up that was impossible to cover.

Earlier that day, Tony found out that Naird would be out of office for a few hours so he stopped by the control center and told Chan, “General Naird is going to be out of office for a few hours so I was thinking we could maybe sneak into his office.”

“Tony, are you sure that’s a good idea?” Chan lowered his voice and glanced around. “What if we get caught?”

“We won’t, I promise. Can we please sneak into his office? Please?” Tony pouted, and Chan, of course, gave in.

“Fine, but if we get caught it’s your fault.” Chan broke into an adoring grin as Tony pumped his fists triumphantly before grabbing Chan’s hand and leading him out of the control room.

Even though Naird was out of office, Brad was still working outside of Naird’s office and Tony distracted Brad by pointing at the pile of papers on Brad’s desk and exclaimed, “Brad! There’s an Applebee’s gift card in there!”

“Really? Where?” Brad cluelessly asked, immediately searching through the papers. While Brad was distracted, Tony and Chan slipped into Naird’s office and locked the door before he noticed that they snuck into the office. Naird’s office was much more spacious than Tony’s office but the first thing Chan did was sit down in Naird’s chair.

Chan leaned back in the chair and folded his arms behind his head as he put his feet on the desk. “So this is what it feels like to be the general of the Space Force.”

As he watched Tony rifle through the files on the bookshelf, Chan took his feet off the table and his arms fell to his sides. “Find anything interesting?”

“Nope, just boring paperwork.” Tony tossed away the files he was holding, obviously not concerned with being subtle. He walked over to Chan and casually straddled his boyfriend’s hips. “Have you ever wondered what it’s like to make out on the chair of the general of the space force?”

“No, not really,” Chan admitted. Before he could talk for any longer, Tony connected their lips and placed his hands on the sides of Chan’s face. Chan’s hands instinctively flew up to tug at Tony’s hair but Tony was too distracted by the taste of Chan’s chapstick to care that his boyfriend was messing up his hair. Both of them were too occupied with kissing to notice that Naird had walked into his office through the back door.

“What on Earth is going on here?”

Naird’s voice scared Chan and Tony so much that they both tumbled out of the chair, bringing it down with them. They both scrambled to stand up and Tony attempted to fix his hair as Chan tried to smooth out the wrinkles on his lab coat.

“Would one of you like to explain what’s going on here?” Naird demanded as he crossed his arms, glaring at the couple.

Chan said “Nothing!” at the same time Tony blurted out “We were making out in your office.” Naird’s eyes widened at Tony’s statement and Chan elbowed Tony roughly, expressing that he was upset that Tony had accidentally blown their cover.

“Wait a moment, you two are together? How long has this thing been going on?” Naird inquired while watching Chan pull the chair upright.

“A few months. You’re the last person to know,” Chan answered, his voice flat.

Naird brought his hand up to his forehead and squeezed his eyes shut as he tried to silently connect the dots. Suddenly, Tony gasped and turned towards his boyfriend, “Wait, does this mean Angela won the bet?”

Chan glumly nodded his head. “I think so. It’s been two weeks since the bet and we both bet that it would take a few months.”

Dropping his hand, Naird glanced back and forth between Chan and Tony. “Hold on, what bet?”

Tony slipped his hands into the pockets of his pants and said, “Oh, Angela, Chan, and I all placed bets on how long it would take you to figure out that Chan and I are dating.”

“God, I hate you both so much,” grumbled Naird. He pointed a finger at Chan and Tony. “The next time I come back early and find you guys eating each other’s faces off in my office, there will be consequences. Understood?”

Chan and Tony both nodded before they walked out of the office, hand-in-hand. Naird shook his head, still confused at how he didn’t catch on to their relationship until he walked in on them making out in his office. Maybe he was more unobservant than he thought.

**Author's Note:**

> hope u enjoyed that fluff fest! pls leave a comment or a kudo on your way out!


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